Keith Nomura: My last name is Nomura. My dad is Kiyosuke Nomura and he was a resident of Alameda for fifty-six years. My mom was born here at Alameda, she was born in Alameda hospital. The story I'd like to tell is my dad's story. He was born in the Central Valley and then came to Berkeley when his father died when he was ten, they lived in Berkeley until the war broke out. My dad was going to Cal at the time, he was a senior at the University of California. He was scheduled to get his degree in botany from the university. But he was a basketball star, he was known in this area as a basketball star. He played for a Japanese league who actually won the state championship for its division. My dad, unusual for his generation, was six-foot-two, and so he was the star center. That's how my mom and my dad met. My mom went to go watch the basketball game and saw this handsome, tall, six-foot-two Japanese man, and she was a cutie herself, and so they met and started dating. And then December 7, 1941, and shortly after that the evacuation of Japanese Americans from Alameda.

In April of '42, all the Japanese had to go to Tanforan race track in San Bruno. That's where my dad ended up with his family, my mom with her family, and from Tanforan they went to Topaz, Utah. He did technically receive his diploma, it came in this mailing tube, and it actually says "Kiyosuke Nomura, Barrack 20, Apartment 9, Tanforan Assembly Center, San Bruno, California." Now, the irony is I didn't know about this until 1991 myself. On the fiftieth anniversary of World War II, University of California, Berkeley, had a special convocation, a special ceremony just for the class of 1942 of the Nisei or the Japanese who didn't graduate that year. At that ceremony, my dad got to graduate. He wore a cap and gown, they gave him a special certificate, students of Cal made blue and gold leis, paper crane leis that each graduate wore. The Cal band was there playing for them. They had the ceremony in Zellerbach auditorium, he was standing remotely. When the graduates entered the room, standing ovation probably for at least over five minutes, people were just cheering the graduates as they entered. It was one of those moments that I know I'll never forget, and I think everybody in the auditorium will never forget. In subsequent letters and articles that I've read about that ceremony, folks who were there from the university, the board of regents, folks that met us were so touched by it, they had meetings to talk about it afterwards, people who would tear up about what had happened.

So shortly after that convocation, my dad felt like he finally had graduated. That's when I found out about this diploma. So he took it out of the drawer he'd had it in for the last fifty years, and he opened it up like I'm opening it up now, and then he handed it to me. "Regents of the University of California, by nomination of the faculty of the College of Commerce, have conferred upon Kiyosuke Nomura, the degree of Bachelor of Science with all the rights and privileges thereto pertaining, given at Berkeley this twenty-second day of May in the year 1942." Of course, he wasn't there to receive it then, but finally he felt like he had graduated. It was one of the most memorable times I had with my father. Because like a lot of folks in his generation, he didn't talk much about... he started to actually share some of his stories and open up. He also made an effort to go to Alameda High School, one of the teachers there invited him to come and he spoke to a U.S. History class. And after he did that, I sort of vowed myself that I would also carry on his story. I'm a former principal in Alameda. During my term here, I also spoke to elementary schools and high schools. He passed in 2000, but it's a real privilege for me to participate in this because, to be able to share my dad's story, my parents' story, I think is really important.